Hello beloved child of God, I hope you’re fine by God’s grace and I hope you’ve been doing your homework.
Today we’re going to talk about the origins of our life-lenses.
You didn’t come into the world seeing yourself as undeserving, inadequate, entitled or perfectionistic. Rather, you learn these patterns through repeated experiences. Life-lenses are established from childhood. They emerge from abuse, abandonment, betrayal, criticism, natural disasters, loss, rejection and other emotionally powerful events.
As we’re in this journey of understanding our life-lenses and trying to change them, it’s important to trace where they come from.
When you understand the origin of your life-lenses, you can realize that you’re not really crazy, fundamentally messed up, or weird.
In this journey, you have to practice self-forgiveness, and not self-condemnation, you have to forgive yourself for those life-lenses, but you also have to keep in mind that you’re not to condemn your parents or tutors for which ever life-lens they contributed to pass on to you. What’s certain is, even if they did pass on problematic life-lenses to you, it wasn’t intentional and they also passed on good things to you. Remember that parents aren’t God, they’re not perfect and they’re learning as you’re growing.
Proverbs 22:6 NIV
Start children off on the way they should go, and even when they are old they will not turn from it.
Example: Childhood Origins Of Life-Lenses
Today we’re going to look at an example from the Anxiety and Depression Workbook for Dummies. The story of Jennie who struggles with depression and Anxiety. She identified her life-lenses as intimacy-avoidant and entitled. She also realizes that she is perfectionistic but flips to feeling inadequate when she makes a mistake. Jennie reflects on her childhood for possible causes of her life-lenses by filling the table below.
| Lens | Opposite lens |
| Unworthy: This life-lens doesn’t apply to me | Entitled: My mother always made me feel like our family was way better than others’. Not trying to blame her but I’ve got to admit that she spoiled me too. |
| Abandonment-fearful: This life-lens does not really fit | Intimacy-avoidant: Although I was told I was special, I never felt anyone listened to me. Whenever I was sad or lonely, my parents told me how lucky I was to have all the toys, clothes and luxury I did. I decided it was better to never need anyone. |
| Inadequate: Whenever I made a mistake, my father made me feel stupid | Perfectionistic: My father was incredibly concerned about how we looked to other people. My parents were so critical that I tried to be perfect. |
Jennie’s Reflections
When I look back on my childhood, I realize that my family was pretty cold. They expected me to be perfect, and when I wasn’t, I was treated with scorn. It’s no wonder I feel anxious about being perfect and I feel depressed when I’m not. There wasn’t a lot of love in my family, so I’ve learned to keep my distance from others. I was taught that possessions and status are more important than people, so I’ve invested too much time and effort on getting the things I want, but I feel empty and lonely.
As you see above, Jennie was able to look back and trace the roots of her life-lenses from her childhood.
It’s important to say here that we’re not trying to blame our parents. People aren’t born with a “Perfect Parent Manual“, they learn it as they get married, have kids and start parenting. They aren’t perfect, and they give only what they have received. The purpose of this exercise is not to point fingers at parents, they probably did their best, our aim is just to know ourselves better, and to know the origins of our life-lenses, in order to fight them better.
Exercise: Childhood Origins Of My Life-lenses
It’s now your turn.
Go back to your answers to the Problematic Life Lenses quiz and pick your problematic life lenses (those you rated 3 and above)
For each of those life-lenses, reflect on your childhood, try to remember events and feelings. Then fill the table below with anything from your childhood which you believe may have contributed to your problematic life-lenses.
After you’ve filled this table, take time to write down your reflections.
| Lens | Opposite Lens |
| Unworthy: | Entitled: |
| Abandonment fearful: | Intimacy-avoidant: |
| Inadequate: | Perfectionistic: |
| Guilty and blameworthy: | Guiltless: |
| Vulnerable: | Invulnerable: |
| Help-seeking: | Help-avoidant: |
| Under-control: | Over-control: |
Conclusion
The origins of our problematic life-lenses can be found in our childhood.
Even the most loving, God-fearing and caring parents pass on to their children not only their good habits and mindsets but also at times perceptions which are flawed either intentionally or unintentionally. We carry these things into adulthood. Some of which are good, but some of which too are problematic life-lenses.
Reflecting on them without trying to blame anyone is a good thing to do, in order to sort out the good from the bad and to open up to God’s Word to correct our flawed perceptions so that we see life not through the life-lenses we got from our parents or from childhood but through the lens of God’s Word.
Prayer
Father Lord God Almighty, bless my parents, my tutors and all those who cared for me during childhood. I choose to forgive whoever hurt me in childhood and contributed to me having problematic life-lenses. Help me to renew my mind Lord and to see my life through the lens of Your Word in Jesus Christ’s Name. Amen.
It’s Now Your Turn
Share about a Problematic life-lens and a childhood origin. What are your reflections about this? Let us know in the comments section.
Your home work today again is to invite someone whom you know will greatly benefit from learning how to identify their life-lenses and how to renew their mind.
Don’t forget to share this blog post on your social media accounts and to invite your friends and family members to join us as we’re waging war against depression. You may save a life by sharing.
If you’ve not done it yet, subscribe to my Newsletter so as not to miss any post on depression and also, make sure to invite anyone whom you know is suffering from depression.
Click here to subscribe to my Newsletter.
Also, please consider sharing this blog post on all your social media accounts.
Invitation
Click here if you’re looking for a church. I recommend Elevation Church to you. A wonderful Christ-centered Church in which you aren’t limited by your location and in which you can see what God can do through you.
If you’ve enjoyed reading this blog post please subscribe to my Newsletter so as not to miss any new post.
Also, please consider sharing this blog post on all your social media accounts.
God bless you
Victoria Eyog
0 Comments